Sophocles
(496 - 406 BC) Greece
Athenian tragedian and dramatist
The young Sophocles was beautiful, and a man named Lampros had taught him dancing and music when he was a boy. After the sea fight at Salamis (480 BC) Sophocles danced around the victory monument playing the lyre, nude and rubbed with olive oil - though according to others he was clad. When he produced his Thamyris he played himself the cythara, and when he staged Nausicaa he excelled in the ball game.
Sophocles produced his first plays in 468 BC, when he won the prize in competition with Aeschylus, and wrote over 120 plays in total, of which only seven survive. He modified the form of tragedy by the introduction of athird actor, and speeded the action by lessening the role of the chorus. Wheres he said of Euripides "he paints men as they are", he said of himself "I paint men as they ought to be" and is noted for his noble grandeur and preservation of traditional values.
Sophocles' passion for young men was well known, and several anecdotes (some of them scandalous) survive, along with the name of one of his lovers - Demophon. One story tells of his rivalry with Euripides for the favors of a boy prostitute.
Athenaios, who liked gathering anecdotes about the lives of the great men of antiquity, relates one of Sophocles's misadventures:
"One day, Sophocles (who was around 65 years of age at the time) led beyond the walls of the city a beautiful youth in order to enjoy him. The lad spread his rough himation (a cheap coat) on the grass and the two covered themselves with the elegant chlanis of the poet. When the thing was done, the boy snatched the chlanis, leaving the himation for Sophocles. Naturally word of this got around, and as soon as Euripides found out he made great fun of it."
Plays:
- Ajax
- Electra
- The Trachinian Maidems
- Philocletes
- Antigone
- Oedipus Tyrannus
- Oedipus at Colonus
|